Oliver Goldsmith's The Vicar of Wakefield (1762)

Oliver Goldsmith’s The Vicar of Wakefield : A Tale Supposed to be Written by Himself (1761-2)

Goldsmith (1730-1774): The Traveller (1764), The Deserted Village (1770), She Stoops to Conquer (1773) + reviews & essays. Awkward Irishman who worked in medicine before turning to professional writing.

Plot
The Primroses (6 children) live in a pastoral paradise until the parson learns that his merchant in town has a done a runner with the family fortune. They relocate to a Cure on Squire Thornhill’s estate. This last is a notorious libertine, and while this worries the parson, his daughters welcome the attempt on their virtue, already anticipating their victory. Meanwhile, George, the eldest son, is sent to London to make some money to add to the family coffers.
On the way to their new abode, the family meets Mr. Burchell (aka Sir William Thornhill) at an Inn where they pay his tab for him. He becomes a family friend—and something more to Sophia.
Olivia falls for the Squire despite receiving an offer from the good farmer, Mr. Williams. She ends up eloping with the Squire and surrendering her virtue after a sham wedding. The vicar recoups his daughter only to return home to find his house in flames. He ends up in the gaol because his landlord (the Squire) insists upon being paid regardless. George joins him (arrested for instigating a duel against the Squire). Olivia is reported dead (from shame) and Sophia gets abducted (the Squire’s plot, of course). Miss Wilmot is poised to marry the Squire.
Enter Mr Burchell, who is actually Sir William Thornhill in disguise. He rescues Sophia and Olivia is found to be alive. Just when it looks like Wilmot has lost his fortune to the Squire (the youngsters are not married, but the deeds have been signed), it turns out that the Squire’s righthand man, Jenkinson, reveals that the sham marriage was not a sham at all, and Mr. Thornhill is in fact married to Olivia. The Squire is sent away and the novel wraps up with a double wedding (Sir William & Sophia; George & Arabella). Even the Primrose fortune is restored from the rogue merchant.

The catchy
• I was ever of opinion, that the honest man who married and brought up a large family, did more service than he who continued single, and only talked of population. For this motive, I had scarce taken orders a year before I began to think seriously of matrimony, and chose my wife as she did her wedding gown, not for a fine glossy surface, but such qualities as would wear well (9).
• The little republic to which I gave laws… (22).
• Disproportioned friendships ever terminate in disgust; and I thought, notwithstanding all his ease, that he seemed perfectly sensible of the distance between us (27).
• But as men are most capable of distinguishing merit in women, so the ladies often form the truest judgments of us. The two sexes seem placed as spies upon each other, and are furnished with different abilities, adapted for mutual inspection (41).
• Fudge! (XI).
• A reformation in the gaol. To make laws complete, they should reward as well as punish (XXVI).
• “Indeed, Sir,” replied she, “he owes all his triumph to the desire I had of making him, and not myself, happy. I knew that the ceremony of our marriage, which was privately performed by a popish priest, was no way binding and that I had nothing to trust to but his honour” (109).
• Thus, my friends, you see religion does what philosophy could never do: it shews the equal dealings of heaven to the happy and the unhappy, and levels all human enjoyments to nearly the same standard (146).

Marriage
Parson Primrose is a strict monogamist. In his view: 1. Bringing children forth in the world is a duty; 2. He minds the family’s spiritual concerns whereas his wife is in charge of the temporal (gendered division of labour); 3. A practical match will become a love match over time (esp. children). His inflexibility on this point leads him to row with Arabella Wilmot’s father, thus compromising his son’s marriage. He maintains that his honour is all the more important in penury and refuses to smooth Wilmot’s ruffled feathers.

Temperence is a virtue
The vicar digs it. His daughters are polar opposites, but neither takes her shtick to excess. They both stick closely to the Primrose personality: “But it is needless to attempt describing the particular characters of young people that had seen but very little of the world. In short, a family likeness prevailed through all, and properly speaking, they had but one character, that of being all equally generous, credulous, simple, and inoffensive” (12). Country bumpkins are poor and simple and are thereby temperate by default.